{"id":48,"date":"2020-11-05T09:25:24","date_gmt":"2020-11-05T14:25:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/?page_id=48"},"modified":"2020-12-15T15:12:05","modified_gmt":"2020-12-15T20:12:05","slug":"your-choosing-i","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/your-choosing-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Miscommunication to Mishap"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Difficulties and Dangers of Communication in Crisis<\/strong><\/p>\n

Introduction:<\/u><\/p>\n

Communication in any disaster is difficult for myriad reasons, and often it can be the key difference between life and death.\u00a0 Particularly in 1912, with radio communication only in its formative years, it is no wonder that communication was a key hardship in the events that unfolded the night of the Titanic<\/em>\u2019s sinking and in the days following the tragedy.\u00a0 Not only was the communication\u2014or lack thereof\u2014on the Titanic<\/em> difficult due to temporal and technological constraints, however it also proved to be extremely dangerous as demonstrated by the tremendous loss of life.<\/p>\n

Difficulties of Communication<\/u><\/p>\n

Communication has transformed entirely from the wireless telegraph system that was used aboard the Titanic<\/em> to the insurmountable types of instant communication we use today, making communication more than a century ago extraordinarily more difficult than its modern form.\u00a0 Published newspaper articles on April 15, 1912 (the day that Titanic <\/em>sank) demonstrate the extent of communication difficulties of the time period clearly.\u00a0 Several newspapers published false headlines that claimed that all passengers were saved, and the Titanic<\/em> was being pulled to shore, most likely due to the garbled telegraph messages of the time (Levinson, 2012, 145).\u00a0 One of these articles, entitled \u201cAll People on the Steamship Titanic Are Safe\u201d published the claim that the passengers were \u201cbeing transferred to the steamer Tarpathia<\/em>.\u201d (Evening News, 1912, 1). \u00a0While this claim likely originated from a garbled telegraph (given the actual steamer that rescued survivors was the Carpathia)<\/em>, others could not be attributed to simply distorted signals.\u00a0 Another article published on April 15, 1912 from the Kansas City Star entitled, \u201cSafe Off Titanic\u201d described a completely fictitious outcome of events.\u00a0 This paper stated that the Titanic\u2019<\/em>s watertight compartments held after the collision, \u201cHowever, the fight was too much for the proud ship and Captain Smith reluctantly permitted the Virginian<\/em> to pass him a hawser and help his water heavy craft toward shore.\u201d The article described further that three other ships arrived to help the distressed Titanic<\/em>, however, \u201ctheir aid was not needed.\u00a0 The passengers were transferred safely on a calm sea.\u201d (Kansas City Star, 1912, 1). Clearly communication at the time that the Titanic <\/em>sank was difficult due to the technological constraints of the telegraph.\u00a0 The signal was easily distorted and at times was difficult to understand.\u00a0 However, communication was evidently difficult beyond just the technological limitations of the time.\u00a0 In times of disaster especially, lines of communication are not always clear, and there is often not enough time to relay transparent messages and confirm sources.\u00a0 In this case, completely false narratives emerged in newspapers all over the globe on April 15, 1912, which spread false hope to many that their loved ones would return home from the Titanic\u2019s<\/em> maiden journey.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Evening News Headline. April 15, 1912.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Kansas City Star Headline. April 15, 1912.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

The Columbus Ledger Headline. April 15, 1912. Notice \u201cWireless proved great life saver\u201d on left column.<\/p><\/div>\n

Dangers of Miscommunication<\/u><\/p>\n

Not only is communication difficult, but miscommunication can be extremely dangerous, and this was certainly the case in the Titanic<\/em> disaster.\u00a0 Communication on board the ship itself was just as complicated as telegraph messages sent to media sources, however it proved much more dangerous than any misreporting in news outlets.\u00a0 The wireless operators on board the Titanic were responsible for relaying messages to the Captain and officers on the bridge, \u201cBut their chief devotion was to their employer, Marconi International Marine Communication Company Limited, an outfit that made most of its profits from sending Marconigram messages of the \u2018Having a wonderful time, wish you were here\u2019 variety,\u201d (Levinson, 2012, 152).\u00a0 This contributed to at least four warnings of ice from ships in the area between 9 am and 1:45 pm not being properly transferred to the officers navigating the Titanic.\u00a0 <\/em>At around midday on April 14th<\/sup>, the wireless stopped working which took nearly seven hours to be fixed.\u00a0 Once it was finally working again, the system was backed up and the operators were overwhelmed with passenger messages.\u00a0 Therefore, ice warnings in the evening and into the later hours of the night were also not transferred to the bridge as they should have been (Levinson, 2012).\u00a0 A particularly important message that had been missed was from the Mesaba<\/em>, which warned of a dangerous ice field in the Titanic\u2019s<\/em> surrounding area.\u00a0 \u201cHad Captain Smith known of that warning, which contained a detailed reading of the dangerous ice conditions in the area surrounding the Titanic<\/em>, he might have considered changing course or reducing speed.\u201d (Levinson, 2012, 152).\u00a0 Another warning which came in one hour before the Titanic\u2019s<\/em> deadly ice collision from the Californian<\/em> was once again not communicated properly to Captain Smith, \u201cwhich was most unfortunate because if heeded it could have prevented the Titanic\u2019s<\/em> sinking,\u201d (Levinson, 2012, 152).\u00a0 The idea that something as simple as relaying messages could have saved the lives of nearly 1,500 people is bleak and troubling, however miscommunication is perilous in any disastrous situation.<\/p>\n

Dangers and Difficulties<\/u><\/p>\n

Communication demonstrated its both difficult and dangerous qualities on the Titanic<\/em> when it came to lifeboat protocols especially. \u00a0Upon the command to begin lowering lifeboats, Captain E.J Smith gave specific “women and children first” orders to each of the officers that were responsible for filling lifeboats.\u00a0 Officer Lightoller, on the port side of the ship, took this order to mean women and children only<\/em>, resulting in lifeboats being lowered prior to reaching full capacity.\u00a0 On the starboard side of the ship, Officer Murdoch interpreted the orders as they were stated, meaning that men were offered seats on lifeboats so long as there were no women and children waiting to board (Levinson, 2012, 149).\u00a0 Since the order from Captain Smith had multiple interpretations, this led to the launch of several lifeboats that were only partially filled.\u00a0 Although the lifeboats had the capacity to accommodate upwards of 1,100 people, only 700 actually survived.\u00a0 While the 400 people who perished due to partially filled lifeboats may not be fully attributed to misinterpretations of orders, perhaps more clear communication could have saved many.\u00a0 There was, however, tremendous stress and pressing time constraints in the ship\u2019s final hours that made communication difficult.\u00a0 While both officers took different approaches to interpreting orders, they were likely each doing what they felt was most appropriate at the time.\u00a0 The difficulties of interpreting and acting on information effectively, however, is never simple in times of crisis and therefore proves extremely dangerous.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Difficulties and Dangers of Communication in Crisis Introduction: Communication in any disaster is difficult for myriad reasons, and often it can be the key difference between life and death.\u00a0 Particularly in 1912, with radio communication only in its formative years, it is no wonder that communication was a key hardship in the events that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-48","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/48","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/48\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-kmoyniha\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}